Garden birds

I don’t know, but the other day a dd sent a little video of ‘a gazillion’ goldfinches around their sunflower hearts feeder!

I have noticed that many birds seem to disappear for a while in Autumn and then start returning round about now as the weather starts to cool.

I live in a town but there are quite a few farmers fields not far away and I wonder if the birds make the most of harvest time and then come back as "pickings" start to run out?

Can't say I've noticed either- it is wise to remember birds are wild creatures and will go where they will- not just there to see you in your garden!

We have a colony of sparrows that roost in the evergreens of 4 gardens. Every lunchtime they come for a swim in the large . bird bath

We seem to have lost some too - robins, tits and goldfinches have deserted us - temporarily I hope. The sparrows are still doing their ablutions though!

Birds often disappear after breeding. The need to moult worn feathers and rebuild energy reserves so they hide away to make themselves less vulnerable to predators. They also disperse to find more abundant food sources in the countryside and new territories before winter.

I’ve already started to see the blue tits and wrens reappearing after a short absence. A few weeks ago, I had a good clear up in the front garden and noticed there was no robin accompanying me, which there usually is. This week they are back and looking very bright. I’m expecting the goldfinches later to feast on the cosmos seed heads.

As PG says above. I’m sure birds prefer berries and/or worms turned up in ploughing.
I’m a bird feeder and I’ll start again from tomorrow, but once I start, it’s necessary to feed every day. Small birds loose so much energy overnight that they need to use that energy to find food asap, so it’s essential they know that my bird feeders are available and replenished daily.

We still have lots of blue tits, great tits, robins and goldfinches. The woodpeckers still appear. A few days ago the feeders were covered with long tail tits. We used to have 5 or 6 blackbirds pottering about but only see 2 at the moment.

We've always been visited by lots of greenfinches along with the goldfinches but this year haven't seen any. Also haven't seen the bullfinches and chaffinches this year that normally call by this time, but that may be because we have spent less time in the garden.

I’ve noticed a huge drop in birds. I haven’t even seen a blackbird all summer. I don’t feed the birds in the summer but restarted putting food out a week ago and it hasn’t been touched.
Our local river is also empty of the common water birds. I see an occasional duck but there have been no coots, moorhens or swans for several years.
I wonder if avian flu has killed our local birds?

Still lots of birds in our garden, eating the sunflower hearts. We’re in Kent, surrounded by woodland.

I did notice earlier in the year that we had fewer starlings than usual this year. Normally they drive me bananas with their noise and taking over all the feeders. They eat us out of house and home while they have youngsters.

I think it is Avian flu season again, apparently a number of wild birds that have died have tested positive for Avian flu.

The usual suspects are in our garden everyday they are like residents here. The flocks of geese flying over has increased dramatically this year.

It’s not cold enough they are spread out the countryside I hope, if not bird flu is a likely cause, yes it affects garden birds too but I expect farmers will get the blame as usual.

David49 I blame farmers for a lot of things, but not bird flu. The seabird populations have been decimated by avian flu - can't blame the farmers for that.

It is migration time, so your birds may have left for better climates.

My DH noticed a robin (American Robin) in our yard looking a bit lethargic, so I kept an eye on him, and he hung about all day. He did get moving, and ate quite a few worms. I expect that he is taking a day off from migrating south to refuel, and perhaps hunker down from expected high winds. Somehow they seem to be good forecasters of weather.

Our robins are fun to watch because they hop around the lawn or garden, cock their heads to listen for bugs and worms, and are extremely accurate one they dive for a worm!

We had put out a block of suet which the Steller's Jays were enjoying, but then the dreaded flock of starlings took over and finished off the lot. They are an invasive introduced species here, so I don't encourage feeding them. I'll wait another week or until cooler weather to put out more suet.

Might there have been a predator bird about? I've sometimes been aware of the birds going quiet and then see a hawk about.

I'm not seeing many birds but yesterday I put the Merlin app on for 5 minutes and it found 17!

Many of ours have disappeared too.

We do have a sparrowhawk in the vicinity but I don't think that is the reason.

Thanks for all your comments. It's eerily quiet in the garden. I hope all the birds come back.

We had a lot of pigeons and doves 2 months ago they could easily have moved to the fields after harvest and the predators would have followed then. A nice slow fat pigeon is a much more attractive prey than a garden bird.

I hope that’s what happened and it’s not bird flu

It’s mainly because this is a Mast year meaning that in the countryside there are more berries, nuts and fruits than in a normal year. So the birds have no need to visit gardens at the moment. But also, worryingly, a disease is currently affecting Blackbirds.

I can't help but blame the red kites around here.

Hi Kamj - we have lots of Red Kites here. They don’t kill their food, they only eat anything that’s pre-killed!

We get loads of golfinches every day enjoying the niger seeds I put out for them, have large trees in the back garden that have different kinds of birds at various times of the day but they never eat anything I put out for them